You Watch Me Prowl In The Darkness
by EnglandBabe1997
Summary: Howard has done more to Tony than anyone knows, except Tony himself. He's tampered with Tony's genes, right down to what makes him human. Until he isn't anymore.
1. Bruce

**This was something I've been working on since August, but I've only just had time to finish x I was reading some stuff and this idea sprung to mind x I hadn't expected to finish this, but today I've had a snow day so I ended up having time xx Please read and review :)**

Bruce hissed as the needle pricked his skin, drawing blood. He forced the Other Guy down as he stirred in response to the pain. Bruce already had all of the team's blood; but the main reason for this exercise was to attempt to determine what had gone wrong with his own attempt to recreate the super soldier serum. Well, he knew what had gone wrong (it was big and green), but he wanted to know why.

The lab was clean and sterile and Bruce was being extremely careful - he knew what his blood could do without him even realising it. If any of the team - particularly Tony, who was perhaps the most defenceless and most human of their team and was to one most likely to be poking around in the lab, even more likely to be so than usual should he find out what experiments Bruce was running - were to come into contact with his blood, if anyone came into contact with his blood he'd never forgive himself.

There were many things he couldn't forgive himself for.

Just for curiosity's sake he decided to run a check on the rest of the teams blood to compare them to the super soldiers blood. He started with Thor's - which was fascinating and in complete contradiction of most scientists' concepts of biology. Then he moved onto Clint's and Natasha's and finally Tony's.

At first he thought he'd made a mistake - a contamination. He double checked, using the help of JARVIS who sounded reluctant even if Bruce couldn't figure out why.

It seemed Tony wasn't as human as they'd thought.

* * *

He called Tony down into the lab to talk about it. Tony looked at the screen and something dark lurked in his eyes that was quickly and expertly hidden. "I didn't know you were testing blood."

"I was looking at the Captain's."

"Did you find anything?"

"Nothing conclusive at the minute."

Tony peered closer at the screen. "Is this Natasha's? I'm surprised - I'd have though the Soviets would've done something."

"Hmm. Natasha's wasn't what I was surprised with."

Tony tensed, but hid it surprisingly well - Bruce only caught it because he was both looking for it and well versed in reading people.

"Yeah? Something weird with Katniss's?"

Bruce decided to stop dancing around the subject.

"Do you know?"

The room was still. Very still, for just a second.

"Yes."

"What happened?"

"Howard Stark happened."

From what Tony had said - or not said - about his father, it was surprising.

"This stays between us."

Bruce hesitated for a moment before looking, really looking at Tony and finding hints of the vulnerability hiding behind the iron mask. He nodded.

Tony relaxed slightly and turned to strut out of the room.

"Do you want to talk about it?"

His friend froze, halfway out of the door.

"It might help?"

"It might not." Tony didn't sound sure about that.

"You could try."

Silence fell in the lab - it was quiet and still and white. For a moment Bruce thought that Tony would walk straight out.

"Howard wasn't pleased that Mom got pregnant he hadn't wanted kids - not yet anyway. Too busy looking for the Star Spangled Captain. When he was in Ukraine looking he found some notes created by the Soviets. They were experimenting with the concept and Mom was pregnant. It was the perfect opportunity."

"Didn't he test it before hand?" Bruce was horrified.

Tony replied scornfully, "He was Howard Stark. Do you really think he thought he could possibly be wrong?"

Bruce shrugged, not willing to interrupt Tony now that he was talking.

"Everything he did was on purpose. He even made sure that it wouldn't affect my physical appearance."

"When did you find out?"

"I was about two or three. I'd some something - I can't remember what. He'd certainly changed his mind about the experiment. He called me an abnormal freak. When I was five or so he got drunk and told me exactly what that meant. My dad spliced my genes with a cheetah just because he found it mildly interesting. He was never there and when he was he was drunk. And Spangles wonders why I hate him." Tony fuming in anger, stormed out of the room.

Bruce decided not to bring the subject up again - not yet.

* * *

Now that he was looking, he could see all of the hints. The way that Tony stilled in conflict and sometimes bared his teeth when he was feeling confrontational. His unnatural speed and grace, that went unnoticed even by Clint and Natasha. His ability to hide in plain sight. The golden gleam in his eyes when they caught the light.  
Bruce hadn't discussed it with Tony again but he continued to examine his blood. In fact, he'd actually abandoned his long sought comparisons between his own blood and Steve's - what had gone wrong and isolating the problem would not solve that nor make him feel any better about it. (Actually, finding out where he'd failed might make him feel worse.) Beyond that, Tony's blood was fascinating.

Every look Bruce took reinforced the idea that this was deliberate. Tony wasn't allergic to caffeine and alcohol and chocolate weren't toxic. He could even take most medicine's - the cheetah DNA had been expertly wound into his own genes in a way so that it would minimise the impact on Tony's life.

This was done to show off, to prove that Howard Stark was better than anyone else was.

He couldn't believe that anyone could be so selfish.

And he definitely couldn't believe the admiration the Captain held for him. Tony had very valid reason to loathe his father but Steve wouldn't - couldn't - believe that. Instead he mentioned Howard as a hero, a man to be admired.

Bruce couldn't even bring himself to like the man.

Tony's life had been irrevocably changed on a whim. That had happened to Bruce - and he knew that neither of them had appreciated it.

* * *

Loki had escaped his imprisonment in Asgard.

Fury was not at all happy. In fact, he was, well, furious. He was living up to his name in a way that was wholly impressive. When Thor had landed on Earth, using the newly repaired Bifrost, Fury had nearly thrown something at him.

"What shall we do about my brother?" He asked.

Fury almost scowled. "We were hoping you could tell us."

"He will come to Earth to take vengeance for his defeat," Thor said gravely, telling them what they already knew.

"Wonderful. Should we be expecting him any time soon?"

"I do not know when he will arrive. He may be here already."

"I doubt that. It's too quiet. Last time he managed to destroy the SHIELD base, Manhattan and kill a large number of people."

"That really ruined my day. And my suit," Tony snarked.

"It wasn't funny," Steve snapped. Even though the pair of them weren't as bad as they were the first time they'd met on the Helicarrier, perhaps they could even be called friends, they still had bad days. Usually when Tony and Fury stood in the same room for more than ten seconds.

"I never said it was. Maybe you need to check your hearing."

Steve actually _snarled_, already wound up.

Like before, when the argument escalated, something happened. Maria Hill's voice echoed over the intercom. "Sir!"

Fury immediately stalked out and briskly made for the control room, followed by the Avengers. He arrived to find Agents swarming around like anxious bees. "What's going on?" He snapped.

"We think it's Loki."

Fury gnashed his teeth. "Wonderful," He repeated sarcastically.

Thor was peering concernedly at the computer monitors, looking for his brothers location.

"He's in London at the minute, as far as we can tell."

Tony sighed. "Great. More air travel."

"But you love air travel!"

"Only when it's my suit."

Fury grit his teeth. "Why are you still here?"

The Avengers looked at each other curiously, seemingly wondering the same thing, before all turning on their heels and making for the jet.

"Hill, keep an eye on them," Fury warned, scanning the monitors yet again.

"Yes sir," she saluted before striding on down the monitors.

Fury rolled his eye.

* * *

They landed in London relatively quickly, particularly in comparison to other types of aircraft. On one of them, rather than a Stark Special (as they'd been fondly reminded, numerable time on their journey), they'd still be halfway over the Atlantic.

London seemed quiet were they'd landed. There was no one running and screaming, like a bad cliché, and it seemed pretty peaceful.

The thought was jinxed though.

Just as Clint mentioned the calm aloud, of course there was a heart wrenching scream from somewhere nearby and then a hoard of footsteps like a small stampede from the Lion King.

The team prepared themselves for battle.

And stared when a hoard of cats rushed at them from around the corner. Steve looked as though he'd never seen something small and fuzzy before and Bruce, who had already Hulked out, was staring at the purring felines with great puzzlement. He leant forwards experimentally to poke one, before picking it up, surprisingly gently, and stroking it softly.

"Who's idea was this?" Tony asked bewildered.

"Most likely, my brother's," Thor answered promptly.

"You don't really care if we kill him do you?"

Thor glared threateningly at Tony.

He put his arms up defensively. "Okay, okay, okay. No harming Loki. Just the cats."

He looked at them pained. In an odd way they were sort of family, or at least distantly related to him, and he promptly blocked out that thought, realising how weird it sounded. Wwhen had this become his life?

Steve was still looking like someone had killed his dog. He couldn't kill small fluffy house pets!

Tony looked around in confusion. The Hulk was being used as a scratching post for at least twenty of the felines, Steve was slowly bring backed into a wall by advancing cats and even Clint and Natasha were doing their best to minimise damage, if still killing some.

Whose smart idea had this been?

Oh yeah, Loki's.

Tony dismantled the suit slowly, unwilling to fry any of his kin with his repulsors.

"What are you doing?" Clint shouted at him, fending off a ginger tomcat.

Tony didn't answer, instead turning to snarl at the nearest cats, who backed away in fear, recognising a much larger cat. A few of them scampered off down the nearest alleyway, followed by some in the crowd surrounding Steve. They didn't come back.

Slowly, cat by cat, the hoard diminished. Clint, seeing what Tony was doing, tried to hiss at one of the felines but received a claw to the leg for his troubles.

At last, the final cat disappeared off down the alleyway, all except one still being petted by the Hulk. At the Captain's coaxing, the Hulk put the cat down and it scampered off to join its co-conspirators.

The Hulk seemed to pout, before shrinking down the Bruce and passing out on the pavement. Tony reached into his armour to hand him the spare pair of pants he'd carried since the press incident of three months ago.

He then got into his suit, letting it assemble around him, and took off into the sky, knowing that the secret he'd been hiding was about to come out.

* * *

Steve looked around confused. Tiny had somehow intimidated a hoard of angry cats that had been trained to attack, Bruce was lying unconscious at his feet and he wasn't entirely sure what to tell Fury. How was he supposed to explain this?

Bruce stirred at his feet, looking dazed. "What happened?"

Clint looked creeped out. "We were attacked. By cats."

"And then Tony drove them off."

Something flashed in Bruce's eyes before he clambered to his feet, looking over them deliberately. "Where _is_Tony?"

Clint shrugged. "Probably gone back to the Tower."

Steve nodded in agreement. "That sounds like a pretty good idea."

Bruce couldn't agree more.

* * *

They got back to the Tower quickly, giving a disbelieving Fury at quick explanation and a promise that he could find out more in the mission reports (which only Steve and Natasha ever actually handed in).

Exhausted, they made their way up the elevator, only to find Tony on the sofa whiskey glass well in hand.

"Hey," he acknowledged them softly.

"Hey," Bruce replied soundly oddly sympathetic.

"What was that all about?" Clint asked confused.

"Indeed Man of Stark!" Thor boomed.

Tony shrugged deprecatingly. "Cats have never liked me."

Natasha eyed him curiously. "No. It's something more than that. I've never seen cats act like that around anyone."

"And you would be an expert on cats wouldn't you?" Tony snorted.

Natasha twitched slightly. "It was a mission."

Bruce put a gentle hand on the inventors shoulder. "Maybe it's a good idea to tell them."

Tony threw Bruce a hard look. He backed away with his hands in the air.

"A good idea to tell us what?" Steve repeated sharply.

Tony threw Bruce another look before sighing and leaning back on the sofa.

"That I'm part cat."

* * *

There were quite a lot of incredulous questions after that particular revelation. Without answering any of them, Tony rose to his feet and disappeared into his workshop, leaving Bruce behind to explain.

"He's part what?" Steve asked looking lost, as though this is one part of the twenty first century he hasn't encountered yet.

"Cat. He has the genetics from a cat spliced into his DNA."

Steve looks confused. "How did it happen?"

Even Thor looks at him pityingly for that, guessing that however it happened it wasn't accidental. But Steve is too pure for that. He fought in World War Two and he still can't even imagine someone deliberately doing something like this.

"Howard," Bruce said bluntly because he knew this was going to hurt and Tony's hurting as well so he wasn't going to sugar-coat it.

"What happened?" Natasha asked in a tone that was almost sympathetic, because Steve had been rendered mute.

"Tony told me that he was looking for Steve when he came across some notes on transgentics."

Thor very gently interceded, "What is transgentics?"

"It's moving genes from one particular species to another. In this case it's the genes from a cat, specifically a cheetah."

"Why would this happen?" Steve asked horrified.

"I don't know. But it was deliberate. Tony is very sure of that."

Clint asked, "How do you know?"

"It's specifically designed do the genes don't affect his appearance. Things like medicine, alcohol and caffeine aren't toxic. And Tony told me that when he was a child Howard called him an abnormal freak. A few years later he proceeded to tell Tony exactly what he'd done to Tony's body."

Steve looked aghast, clutching hard onto the arm of the sofa. Thor looked distressed, wanting to comfort their 'SHIELD brother'. Bruce knew the feeling.

Natasha and Clint looked an odd cross between sympathetic, understanding and anger. Natasha looked as though she wanted to put a bullet cheerfully into Howard's head and Bruce would've been glad to help her.

None of them knew what to say, so they all just sat there in silence until it became clear that Tony wasn't coming back up.

* * *

They don't discuss it again. Not yet.

But now when they look they can't help but notice the golden gleam in his eyes and the predatory gaze when he wants something.

They've all been trained to notice that.

They just don't know how to talk about it.

It's like living on a knife edge, the precarious balance between talking and silence. They haven't decided yet which is better - for Tony, for the Avengers, for them.

But they know that if Tony wants to talk about it, actually wants to discuss it, he'll bring it up with them.

So they stay on the knife edge, watching the cheetah hunt, and none of them say anything.


	2. Prequel

**This is a prequel to the previous chaoter x I don't know if I'll continue from after the first chapter, but I might - so read and review x I would re-organise it so the prequel was first, but this doesn't really make sense without reading that x **

**If I put more chapters in I'll label them with the chapter number and title this prequel x Please read and review x**

* * *

Tony hadn't realised how weird he was before. Sure he'd learnt a long time ago not go move as fast as he could do, but he couldn't work out what was wrong with what he could do.

Couldn't the others do it?

And if they couldn't, of he was special, why wasn't that a good thing? His mama told him he was special, special in a good way and not to listen to anyone who said otherwise.

He'd believed her.

That had all changed now.

This was one of his earliest memories, and was certainly not his most happy, even it was perhaps the most enlightening of everything.

"You're a freak! An abnormality." His father shouted at him, drunken and angry.

Tony had just stared at him, eyes wide in fright and brimming with tears at the words. He didn't quite understand their meaning but he understood the intention, the hatred behind his father's tone.

Howard threw his glass with deadly aim.

Tony scampered out of the way, his speed inhuman and ears twitching in terror. Howard looked murderous at the sight, baring his teeth viciously.

Tony scuttled up the stairs as fast as he could, not stopping until he'd reached his room and locked his door behind him, not coming out until morning, despite Jarvis' frantic knocks.

He avoided his father for the next three weeks, but never forgot what he'd said.

* * *

He and his father had never gotten along, even less since Howard had called him an abnormal freak.

At the time he hadn't realised how wrong Howard was - to treat a child like that, his own son.

He still didn't believe that it wasn't normal, but other people said it was wrong, so it must be.

But what did he know? His emotional capabilities barely surpassed that of a child's.

But he wasn't a child anymore, not really, looking down at his parents graves.

He was truly alone now, but hadn't he already been before?

Maria Stark, who despite everything, had cared about him and loved him in spite of her drunken tendencies and weak will that had led to her staying with Howard despite everything. She had allowed Howard to make him into a science experiment, but if she'd said no he still would have done it anyway.

Tony could admit that he would miss her and that he'd loved her, but he would be hard pressed to say anything else.

Howard Stark, the man who had destroyed him humanity, his life, for his own personal amusement - for nothing more than to see if he could. Howard Stark had been playing God, and no one had liked it, not even Howard. After all being God hadn't found Captain Rogers - so what were they worth? What worth did any of them have to him?

It was only his wife and son after all. Howard hasn't minded stepping on them to get to the big picture.

No, he wouldn't miss Howard at all. Howard was the cause of everything wrong in his life and then some. He had been abusive, drunk and absent. So absent that Tony doubted he would notice the difference now that Howard was gone.

His ears twitched in fury and, for once, at Howard's funeral, he did not suppress the impulse.

He knew that, wherever he was right now, Howard would be shaking with fury.

He was glad.

* * *

Tony hid his instincts after that, knowing that what Howard had told him was fundamentally right - he was abnormal. But that didn't make it a bad thing.

But abnormal things were locked up and studied and replicated and Tony had better things to do with his time than break himself out of various cages. Things like partying and alcohol.

He'd been relieved to find out that he could drink alcohol. When he was fourteen he'd snuck into Howard's lab (not father, never dad) and failing to find records of the experiment that he was, he'd tested his blood. He was good for things like chocolate - which he'd already known - and most medicines and coffee and alcohol.

He'd been so relieved that he'd poured himself a glass from one of Howard's prized bottles of brandy, lined along the shelf. It had been his first taste at alcohol.

But he could drink alcohol, and he knew that it was only a fraction of luck and Howard's further meddling that allowed him to.

He could drink alcohol so he was damn well going to do it.

And he did. He drank his way through MIT, picking up girls (and a few guys) as he went. He also picked up Rhodey, who stick around for reasons Tony could fathom, and somewhere near the end Virginia Potts, who was quickly, and affectionately, nicknamed Pepper.

Both of them had stuck around longer than anyone else had, ignoring him odd habits and the way his eyes gleamed in the dark. It seemed they both had a policy of don't ask, don't tell, one that Tony greatly appreciated.

They'd stuck around for this long.

He had a feeling that they be around for quite a bit more.

For the first time, he was alright with that.

* * *

He made weapons, just like Howard did, because that was all people expected him to be, wasn't it? A mirror image of Howard, someone he could hate everything he looked in the mirror.

When he went out he got Pepper to check how he looked. He pretended it was for her admiration, but knew that it was do that he didn't have to look at his own reflection.

He was glad that Pepper played along. She always did seem to know when to push, and when to leave it alone.

He liked her more than ever for that.

* * *

So the weapons manufacturing continued and he saw Howard Stark in every reflective surface until he was blown up in Afghanistan. At first he thought about giving up, about giving in for the first time.

Maybe it was time - he'd proven he would never amount to anything.

Nothing beyond what he'd been created to be.

He was a cat, of course he was terrified of water. They'd picked the best way to torture him, water in his ears and his nose and his mouth until there was water in his lungs. He was drowning in water and despair and the fear that everyone reeked of. He struggled in his captors grip but his cheetah's strength had long since been suppressed at the memory of Howard and his fury.

He was less now of what he was than he'd ever been before, and it had taken him this to realise it. He had been hiding himself for so long in the memory and fear of a dead man.

Maybe this would be the end. He would be ready and waiting for it when it came.

And then his eyes reflected off the car battery and shone gold, gleaming in the darkness of the cave.

He had been created for this. And maybe he could be more than that. More than an a experiment.

For the first time since Howard died he consciously tried the wriggle his ears, desperately trying to remember the feeling that he'd almost forgotten so long ago. He thought of how silly he looked and almost stopped, just as his left ear wriggled.

He smiled slightly before it darkened into something colder as he looked at the wires leading out of his chest.

He needed to do something about that.

Then he needed to escape.

And then he needed to figure out what he was, not what he'd been created to be.

* * *

He built the Iron Man armour and never looked back. The second model was painted gold to always remind him of his eyes, of the light in the darkness.

That he had the strength of a cheetah inside him, he just needed to remember that.


	3. Palladium

**I'm sorry this is so short, particularly compared with the other chapters, but I have a feeling the rest are going to be shorter than the first two, if not as short as this one :) I didn't get much feedback for the last chapter so please read and review this one xx**

He was dying. What with everything that had been done to his genes and there was nothing in his blood to prevent palladium poisoning. Then again, it was unlikely that Howard ever considered the possibility, even though he considered most other things.

Howard didn't consider how other people would survive without vibranium, when he used it all in the good Captain's shield and the goddamn man went and buried it in the ocean with him.

There is cheetah blood running through his veins, poisoned by the metal that powers his heart.

Isn't that just a metaphor for who he is?

What he's been created to be and who he's created for himself, colliding until it destructed somewhere near the middle and he hurts the few people he cares about on the way.

He saw it all unfolding like a map and it was trapped inside his head. He couldn't look at Pepper without seeing how devastated she would be about his death, and there was nothing he could do about it.

He couldn't do anything.

Or at least that's what he thought.

Even when he'd gone to tell Pepper the truth, to get it over with, he'd been distracted by the image of Howard's plan for the Stark Expo. He's a cat, it's in his nature to be easily distracted by shiny things and this model was definitely shiny.

But this took the cake, to not be able to do the right thing by Pepper because of what Howard had made him to be.

Even from beyond the grave Howard was screwing up his life.

Tony didn't know what it said about him that he let it.

He ignored it though, and carried on working, because although he'd just about given up hope, there was no way he was going to let the Ten Rings win, to let Obadiah win, to let Howard win. Because if he lost against himself they had.

If he lost against himself then he was nothing more than the abnormal freak Howard had created. He would have done nothing with his life, only gamble and fool around and murder innocent people with the legacy his creator gave him.

Tony growled.

He would not let that happen.

That is what Iron Man is for. But if Tony was dying, perhaps the world needed a new Iron Man.

* * *

In the depths of his madness, or perhaps brilliance, it's remarkable how the two traits coincide, he found the footage of Howard, telling him how proud of Tony he is.

And wasn't that a change?

Normally it's how disappointing, how abnormal, how much of a freak. Normally it isn't nice things.

This time it was.

It knocked him off-balance slightly, because Tony is, first thing first, a mathematician and he can't do anything without all the variables - and they certainly weren't present for that conversation.

There was no data there, no evidence. For all he knew this had been tampered with, beyond belief, to get him to get back to work. Nothing about that footage had made sense, none of it matched up.

The maths wasn't adding up.

Howard put the world back on his axis though.

He was proud at his own genius, his _own_ success, not Tony's. Why would he care about the abnormality that was his son, even of he'd recorded this for him?

This was Howard's last praise, last act of annoyance for Tony Stark, to praise himself from beyond the grave and utterly ignore and diminish the work of Tony. His last act of defiance in a world that had moved on.

And they moved on thinking of Tony Stark.

But somehow, Tony still knew that Howard had won.

* * *

Once upon a time he was proud of his arc reactor, if not the circumstances he received it in.

Now that it's killing him, it is just a reminder that even Howard can build him better than he can build himself.


	4. Natasha

**I'm sorry this is kind of short, but Natasha's head it hard to get into to x Please read and review xx**

Natasha Romanoff knew that there was something different about Tony Stark.

It took her a while to notice - most of his odd behaviours could be explained away by other things, a tactic even Natasha (she was embarrassed to admit) used on some of the more odd eccentricity's. He did something's so strange, she'd rather explain them away than look for another solution, simply because it boggled her mind to think on them.

He was narcissistic, a playboy and a child in a man's body. He was so easily distracted that at times it was more like having a pet dog than a boss.

And then there was the fact that he was dying - and that opened up a whole new can of worms, never mind explanations for his behaviour.

His oddities could be explained away both all those things, a child like mentality leading to his compulsiveness and the playboy persona explaining his predatory gaze.

So, Natasha was ashamed to admit, it took longer than she'd thought to notice something odd about Tony Stark.

He had perfected his masks well. She was impressed.

But when she noticed something was wrong she dug until she had answers.

And she held on like a dog with a bone, until all the secrets were unearthed and her instincts stopped clawing under the skin.

oOo

The first thing she noticed was the odd flash of gold that glimmered in his eyes when they caught the light. It appeared more often when he seemed to be experiencing a strong emotion, a good indicator to his mood, but she didn't know what emotions it indicated or why it happened.

The second thing she noticed was his silence, even better than hers when he didn't give an indication to his approach. It seemed her talked to be heard, because without it he wasn't.

It was like a ghost treading across the floor, one not even she could hear.

Then she noticed the predatory loping gaze, which seemed far more unconscious that when she'd first noticed it. It was clear to her now that the walk was natural, not done to attract other people and draw them in, but it was unnatural at the same time.

It reminded her of a tiger, and she wasn't sure if she liked the similarities.

But still, even with all these odd things that Tony Stark did, she couldn't work out how or _why_, which was sometimes more important than the what.

She puzzled over it for a long time, but couldn't come to any discernible answer.

Not until the incident with Loki.

oOo

Sometimes they had odd meetings at strange times in the mornings, sharing a bottle of vodka between the pair of them. These meetings continued, even after it was revealed that Tony was only part-human.

"Part cat?" She asked, as soon as she was sure he was drunk enough.

He nodded briskly, but slightly woozily. "Yeah. It's not as fun as it sounds."

"It doesn't sound it."

It really didn't.

"You mean you're not part spider, spider girl?"

Natasha threw Tony a slight look, exasperation covering the fondness. it had been a long time since anyone has dared to give her a nickname, and she rather liked it.

It was Tony's way of showing affection, odd though it was.

"Shame. Think of all the fun you could have had."

Natasha shrugged, feeling the buzz of alcohol in her own head. "I live up to the name regardless."

Tony wagged a finger at her. "It was very mean of you, you know, to wait until I was drunk to ask me questions."

She shrugged again. "I know you're not drunk enough to avoid answering what you don't want to."

Tony tilted his head, considering her point, before frowning vaguely. "It still wasn't nice."

She gave him a small smile, barely a twitch of her lips, but she knew he saw it, what with his superior senses.

"What?" Tony asked at her odd look, as a thought occurred to her.

"What's it like being hung-over like that? I can't imagine the headaches are pleasant, what with your hearing.."

Tony shrugged slightly. "I've never known anything different. And it's not bad."

Natasha looked at him intently, seeing no trace of a lie in his face. Of all the things that were bad about him being transgenic, the hangovers were not the highlight, she supposed.

There were bigger things for him to worry about.

She downed another shot as he did, feeling the alcohol swell in her mind. She could hold her liquor, but it was far from her first shot of the evening.

"Sometimes I wonder, you know?" Tony said without prompting.

She didn't need any further explanation. Yes, she did know.

They all wondered who they would be if something had gone differently, what they would be.

Would they be better?

Or would they be worse?


	5. Clint

**Here's Clint's bit for you! It's also for Post U Later :) Please read and review xx Who do you want next?**

Clint noticed straight away that was something weird about Tony Stark. Noticing was his job and he damn good at it, or else SHIELD wouldn't have bothered rescuing him from federal prison. They weren't the kind of organisation to bother themselves with sub-par people, not if the best was on offer.

They went for the best and they either got them or put them into prison so they couldn't cause trouble. That, or killed them.

So Clint noticed something off with Tony Stark right away.

He just didn't know _what_ - and he knew that Phil wouldn't send him off into harm's way so perhaps it was something he didn't need to know.

He'd keep an eye on him anyway. Whilst it might not put him in harm's way to not know Tony's secret, he was curious by nature. He _wanted_ to know what Tony was hiding. They were teammates now - they were supposed to trust each other. And he did trust Tony, and Natasha and all the others.

Tony just didn't seem to trust _them_.

Clint didn't know what it was about Tony that alerted his senses, just something about him. Perhaps it was the way that he walked like a spy, quiet and shifting his weight accordingly. He made noise to signify his presence, not by accident like other people. His eyes were strange, almost feline and he walked with a grace that reminded him of Tasha, at her most dangerous.

So when it was discovered that Tony actually was part cat he wasn't surprised. In fact, he found it hilarious and couldn't stop laughing for twenty minutes. On their team they had a demigod, super soldier, giant rage monster, two assassins and what amounted to a giant cat in a metal suit.

Clint barely resisted the temptation to offer him a ball of string, sensing that the matter was a sore one. Tony was proud of the Iron Man suit and everything else he created. If he wasn't going around shouting his genetics to the rooftops then there was obviously something wrong.

Anyway, Clint had prior experience with large cats, even if Tony was the biggest of them yet. He had lived his teenage years in a cirucs, he knew a thing or two about lions and tigers, even if there had only been a cheetah once. He'd never really had a problem with them - the cubs liked to play and their parents were watchful.

It just reminded him of Tony and JARVIS, maybe Tony and Pepper.

Tony was Tony, just a bit more liable to land on his feet outside of the suit.

* * *

Clint shifted the quiver of arrows on his shoulder to a more comfortable position before aiming and letting the arrow fly, quicker than the speed of light.

As expected, it hit the centre of the target with a loud thunk. He looked at it critically, before deciding that the shot had been up to his usual standard.

He let loose another twenty or so faster than the first two, imagining Loki's face as the target. it soothed a petty, perhaps, and insatiable urge inside him.

"What you doing?" Asked a voice behind him. He barely restrained his urge to jump and his fingers clenched on his bow before he relaxed them after recognising the voice.

Clint turned around to find Tony. "Training."

Tony snorted quietly. "You were death glaring at the target. I thought it was going to spontaneously combust."

"I was imagining something pleasant to shoot."

"Loki?" Tony asked, barely requiring an answer.

Clint nodded before turning his back to shoot another arrow. When he turned back around after another five Tony was still leaning in the doorway, looking as though he had nowhere else to be so he might as well annoy Clint.

"You're damn quiet when you walk you know," Clint told him. "I'm impressed. I can barely hear you."

Tony smirked slightly. "Wait until Pepper hears that I'm undetectable from Clint Barton, Hawkeye himself." He made to leave the room but was stopped by Clint continung the conversation.

Clint smirked himself. "Let's put it to the test."

Tony tilted his head curiously. it looked scarily simliar to what one of the lion cubs had done back in the circus when presented with a problem.

"JARVIS, stealth training mode please," Clint announced suddenly, and all the targets sunk into the floor, lights switched themselves off and several other things rose out of the floor.

It was only by the glint of Tony's eyes that he could see the smile spreading over his face.

* * *

Clint couldn't help but be impressed by the stealth capabilities Tony had obviously inherited from his feline side, and he was willing to admit to it, even if Tony was going to gloat about it for the rest of the day. "That was last place I was expecting you to come from," Clint admitted, astounded by Tony's prowess.

Tony crowed, golden eyes glinting. "Wait 'til I tell Pepper that I beat Hawkeye! No, wait until I tell Natasha!"

And here came the gloating. Clint rolled his own eyes. "I doubt even Natasha would be expecting you from the ceiling. You don't exactly seem to be the person to actually think of that."

Tony stuck his tongue out. "You're just being mean because I beat you!"


	6. Thor

**Sorry that this has taken ages - I've had loads of exams in the last few weeks and I've still got a few left (though not for another week), and before that I just couldn't muster up the energy for this, not to mention my recent addiction to Vampire Diaries x **

**P****lease read and review, and I'm sorry this is so short x It's based on the review from youwannabekate :) I might have another chapter ready soon, though hopefully a longer one (and probably Steve) xx :)**

To be honest, Thor doesn't get the looks that he sees his team mates throw Tony now that they know his secret. They look at him oddly, as though there is something dangerous about him, as though he will do something to hurt them if they turn their backs for even a split second. To be honest Thor is offended on Tony's behalf, even as he knows the other's are slowly getting over their instinctual fear in the only way they know.

He can't blame them for it, not with the lives they live. In their lives it is kill or be killed and that doesn't really leave room for doubts or potential threats. They've been taught to eliminate anything that has the potential to harm them, and quickly. So he can understand why they are so wary, and forgive them for it.

But honestly, it takes a lot more than this to faze him. His brother has given birth to a variety of children, of multiple species - a wolf, a horse and a sea serpent. He is much older than the others on this team, and he's seen far more than even they can imagine.

So yes, it takes more than something like this to throw him.

But the rest of his team is younger and even Natasha is innocent to the world he knows, the kind of world that only comes from living too long and seeing too much. It isn't the kind of world that you get by seeing too much suffering or too much death, though it's something that comes along with it. It comes with watching time pass you by, watching everything around you change until you don't even know where the ground you're standing on came from anymore.

They know nothing of what he's experienced, and he doesn't expect them to. But it means they don't have the Sam kind of perspective as him, the thing that tells him that Tony is exactly the same person since they found out his little secret - after it was let out of the bag, as Tony says, not that he really gets the expression.

Tony still gets drunk and passes out on the floor of his workshop. He still ruins press conferences and spends most of his time on the coms in battle trying to beat the number of villains they've taken down. He still makes inappropriate jokes at inconvenient times and when Natasha threatens to take him down he asks if she can use her thighs. Thor still finds him in the kitchen at three in the morning with a bottle of _something_ alcoholic, with lips far too loose for sobriety.

None of this makes him any different, nor unless they make it.

Tony is still the same person. Thor tries to show that every way he knows how, treating Tony exactly the same way as before, and even though it doesn't seem to do much Tony appears to notice. He sends Thor a slight smile sometimes when things get bad, when he gets mad and his eyes flash gold and the rest of the team eye him like a tiger that's been let out of his cage.

So Thor distracts him by asking some inane question about something he doesn't understand, or maybe something he does just to change the subject. And it works. He now knows why people use Facebook (for no reason at all) and why the grass isn't always greener on the other side (it's a philosophy, Bruce had told him, but Tony had gone off on a ramble about chlorophyll, completely ignoring his thoroughly confused audience). He likes Tony to tell him, because the other man does it so well.

Tony is still Tony, and the others just need to get used to that. And if Tony asks why he's so good about it, then Thor has plenty of stories to tell - you don't get to two thousand without something interesting to say.


	7. Steve

**Here's the second to last chapter, with one more to tie everything up - unless anyone reviews with a really good idea that I think I would write :) After this I'll be focusing on some of my other unfinished stories, so keep your eyes peeled x Thanks to everyone that's read and reviewed and I hope you all do the same for this chapter x **

Steve, despite all evidence to the contrary, is not innocent. He fought in world war two, and knows the price of things, even if he wishes he didn't. He knows what things can cost, has seen the horror that can be wrought at humanity's hand, the fear and cruelty it can inspire.

Steve remembers that very well, seeing Bucky strapped to that table and the tremble in his limbs whenever Steve had reached for him.

He isn't innocent.

But he's still young, and more than a little but naïve. Steve still sees things in clear shades, where the good guys always manage to save the day and the bad guys are defeated and imprisoned and never hurt anyone ever again. He's not stupid enough to think that there is nothing that goes bump in the night, just that it can be defeated if you're clean cut enough, _good_ enough. Seeing the bad in the world has made him twice as determined to see the good in it as well, and Howard Stark was definitely on the good side.

Steve never lets a friend done that's in need, not Bucky when he was captured, not any of his team, and not Howard, who made him strong enough to fight for his country. He values his friends, because as a scrawny weakling he hadn't had many of them until he'd finally been eligible to join the army - and that had been because of Howard.

And because of _that_ he doesn't let anyone disrespect his friends.

Not even their kids, when it seems like the only thing Tony Stark has to say about his father is an insult.

Until now it's always infuriated Steve - because the Howard he'd known was a good man, a kind one, and that kind of disrespect wasn't something he'd tolerate from anyone.

But now he didn't know what to think. He and Tony would probably never be friends, not over the last few months they'd reached an understanding, a team that fought more than battles. He would never ask what Howard had done to Tony because he didn't want to hear it, but he'd picked things up from the others.

The Howard he'd known had been gone a long time ago.

Nothing reinforced this better than the revelation of what he'd done to Tony, the mutation of his genes so that he could be Howard's project. To create something even better than a super soldier.

Horror and disgust was all he could feel, looking at the man who had been rebuilt for science, for curiosity. His own Maker had been one of the people who was supposed to look after him, to be there for him, and he'd torn him apart and put him back together in an arrangement that better suited him.

Steve felt sick.

* * *

Tony refused to talk but that didn't matter because he'd seen enough of the experiments that humans could perform on each other. World war two, and Bucky, was a class example of that.

He didn't really want to know what Howard had done to Tony, only this time for Tony's sake, not Howard's. Talking about those things can help or make them worse, and it's really up to Tony to decide which.

Steve looks at the inventor with horror and Tony looks back in understanding and pity. He knows what it's like to get the reality of the world in one dose and it's something he would wish on very few people, particularly someone as untainted as Steve. He knows that Steve isn't as wholesome as most people think - a side effect of living with the man for the last few months - but he isn't far off.

He also knows that Steve doesn't know how to act now, how to act now that Howard isn't the picture perfect hero that he remembers.

To be honest, Tony doesn't either.

* * *

Steve tries his best. He doesn't really understand how a man can change like this, how he can go from one of the best human beings to one of the worst, with a hundred thousand lives on his hands, with two ash clouds and a laboratory of things too terrible for anyone to talk about.

He doesn't understand how someone can do the reverse, fighting to save the world with only a metal suit to protect himself.

He isn't innocent but he sees the world in shades of black and white and perhaps that's why he's best suited to being the Avenger's leader. The rest of them are too hardened by what they've seen, too close to giving up.

Steve never stops trying to see the good in things, even when the more jaded members of his team laugh cynically at the idea. He never stops trying to make the world a better place.

But in this case he doesn't really see where the good can be found.

Howard had destroyed so many lives, a far cry from the man he had known. What was redeemable about that?

Tony's life had been twisted and pulled out of shape until he was barely recognisable as human, his genetics warped and his childhood ruined, hiding behind a thousand masks because he knew he couldn't depend on anyone to help him.

Steve doesn't know where to find the good in that. It ruins his view of the world.

Tony kind of regrets that.


End file.
